Last month's entry brought some wonderful responses filled with shared pain and encouraging words. I feel compelled to explore the topic of forgiveness more. See last month’s blog for insight into this ongoing discussion.

 

As Christians what should our response be to blatant mistreatment?

 

My personal (and ongoing) challenge with this issue is validating the injustice suffered while reconciling my inner self to Jesus’ command to love, honor and forgive.

 

Because my wounds were not visible I had no outward validation of the wrong done to me. There was nothing to point to as a sign of the trauma I suffered. There were no scars to show the school nurse. No bones to be set by my family doctor. And yet, I regularly went to class with a lacerated heart. If only there had been a way for my scars to be examined. Then my fragile self esteem could have been treated much sooner. But sadly, a doctor cannot put a bandage on a broken heart or a bleeding psyche.

 

But Jesus can.

 

Jesus suffered so much more than I could ever imagine. He knows what it is like to be shamed and rejected by the ones you love. And still He bled for them. Still He died for them. Still He embraced the pain – theirs and His. He became a victim because He knew there would be other victims. And He knew there would be other abusers. And He knew they would need reconciliation through forgiveness.

 

And that is what I ultimately desire – reconciliation.

 

I long for a mutually edifying and rewarding relationship with my estranged family member. Jesus says it’s possible if I’ll do things His way which is recorded in Luke 6:27-29 in the Holy Bible, New Living Translation: "But if you are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. …Pray for the happiness of those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you….If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn the other cheek...”

 

And this is where my inner self gets stuck. I know what Jesus says to do, but I struggle with the willingness to do it. My mind screams but God, don’t you remember when she…

 

And He nods softly in response and then points to Matthew 6:15 in the Holy Bible, New Living Translation which says: “But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.” In other words, Jesus won’t forgive me if I don’t forgive her. Because the reality is Jesus’ blood wasn’t just for my forgiveness, protection and healing. It was for everyone –including the woman who’s hurt me.

 

Philip Yancey offers his view on this topic in his book What’s So Amazing About Grace?:  “… by denying forgiveness of others, we are in effect determining them unworthy of God’s forgiveness, and thus so are we.”

Ouch. The reality of that truth hurts – a lot.

 

And so I am left with a choice: Obey or disobey? Forgive or resent? Grace or ungrace? Reconcile or remain estranged? Spiritual wholeness or impairment?

 

I find my answer in Laurens van der Post’s account of the misery he suffered in a Japanese prison camp as told in his book, The Prisoner and the Bomb:

 

“The only hope for the future lay in an all-embracing attitude of forgiveness of the peoples who had been our enemies. Forgiveness, my prison experience had taught me, was not mere religious sentimentality; it was as fundamental a law of the human spirit as the law of gravity. If one broke the law of gravity one broke one’s neck; if one broke this law of forgiveness one inflicted a mortal wound on one’s spirit and became once again a member of the chain-gang of mere cause and effect from which life has laboured so long and painfully to escape.”